by Andrew Crawshaw
This is a quick preview before I set off for Borehamwood to watch the game
For those of you who don’t keep up with our Women’s team, we won the away leg on 12 September by four goals to nil. Here is a link to the match report on the official arsenal website. https://www.arsenal.com/fixture/women/2019-Sep-12/fiorentina-women-0-4-women-match-report.
First half goals by Vivianne Miedema and Kim Little settled any Arsenal nerves and in the second half a second by Miedema followed almost immediately by a fourth from Lisa Evans gave the Italians no opportunity of staging a comeback. All in all it was a thoroughly professional performance and makes us firm favourites to progress to the last 16 of this tournament.
The match is at Meadow Park, Borehamwood this evening with a 19:30 kickoff and will be shown live on the Arsenal website to all of you who have a digital membership. I would, however, strongly suggest that any of you who can get to the ground do so as support in person is so important for the players on the pitch and is really the best way to appreciate the game. The in ground catering is fully recommended and it is a nice place to watch football. The women’s games are also very cheap to watch and you will be able to get tickets on the gate. You will also be able to get player autographs after the game and may well find your self sitting next to player’s families or friends. Talk to the person next to you you never know who it will be.
Our players are in the middle of a heavy run of fixtures, this will be the fifth match in 2weeks and we play again on Sunday so the Manager, Joe Montemurro, will certainly be rotating the squad and some of the players who started on Sunday will certainly drop to the bench.
Last Sunday, Lia Walti and Emma Mitchell made their first starts of the season after recovering from injury and Jordan Nobbs continued her comeback playing the full game. I would expect all three of them to be on the bench tonight. Beth Mead has played every game so far this season and may well be rested with a view to starting against Brighton on Sunday. Louise Quinn withdrew during the warmup with a tight hamstring and again will probably not be risked tonight.
Team
Pauline Peyraud-Magnin also had her first start in goal and did nothing wrong so may well start again tonight.
In defence, Leonie Maier should continue at Right Back with Jeb Beattie and Viktoria Schnaderbeck at Centre Back, Katie McCabe will probably start at Left Back
In Midfield I would expect to see Kim Little return and wear the Captain’s armband, she will likely be paired with Leah Williamson and Jill Roord
In attack I wouldn’t be surprised to see Melissa Filis start (if she is fit after playing on both Saturday and Sunday) alongside Dutch Duo Vivianne Miedema and Danielle Van de Donk
Subs (subject to fitness)
Zinsberger (GK), Quinn (CB), Grant (Attack), Mead (attack), Nobbs (MF), Walti (MF), Mitchell (LB)
The coverage on arsenal.com starts at 19:15, I’ll try and post updates occasionally from the ground.
Peyraud-Magnin
Evans Schnaderbeck Beattie McCabe
Little Williamson Roord
van de Donk Miedema Mead
Beach: Zinsberger, Mitchell, Nobbs, Walti, Maier
Good luck from _snowy_ Dawson Creek.
COYWG!
Game is underway, UEFA has a commentary page going.
COYWG!
At 43 minutes, Fiorentina gives up a penalty.
COYWG!
It is live on Arsenal dot com if anyone wants to watch.
1 – 0
Good game, Arsenal one nil up Kim Little making no mistake from the penalty spot. I’m not sure that Joe will be terribly happy, although the goal will have helped. Fiorentina matching us for effort and very quick to close us down but haven’t really presented much of a goal threat. I’ve just said hello to Blacksheep, he’s been posting photos through the first half.
How to go Miedema! I gather unassisted. And 2 minutes later, she misses the goal.
COYWG!
Game over. How to go Gunners!
A comfortable win where we were rarely troubled. We could and probably should have won by more but at the end of the day we beat last seasons runners up in Italy by six nil. Sterner tests will come in this competition.
Hackney Gazette has a report up on the game. With a rather unusual player rating section (to my mind).
https://www.hackneygazette.co.uk/sport/football/arsenal/arsenal-women-2-0-fiorentina-6-0-agg-player-ratings-as-little-inspires-gunners-into-champions-league-round-of-16-1-6293314
For those who watched the game, was our goalkeeper shaky?
The Grunod (how does one spell that?) has an article out on the game now. The weather report I seen, was that at game start it was +18C in London. Their article talks about bitter cold for the game. I am the person (in Dawson Creek, BC – where the Alaska Highway begins) who had snow this morning. 🙂
Grunod talked about a 343 or something, and the femtometer Fuse said that Fiorentina changed to 5 at the back at half time after Little converted the penalty. So, the Grunodians missed something there.
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Islington Gazette has the same report sa Hackney Gazette.
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Google no longer sorts news by time, so it quickly becomes annoying to find new news articles. And the news organizations try their hardest, to make their news annoying. So, I am getting doubly annoyed.
Jonathan Moss seems to have made 😈 Mike Riley happy, he has an assignment for this next weekend (CPalace v Norwich).
I think most of PGMO should be in jail, not officiating games. They should be unbiased. They continue to tilt games.